Best Distro to Mess Around?

I'm about to download a Distro to dualboot on my Thinkpad T420, mess around, learn to install and do stuff on Linux, getting everything working and tying to do everyday stuff in Linux, maybe even ricing my desktop, just to spend some time learning something.

What's the best Distro for this purpose?I'm thinking Debian or Fedora.

I'm a big fan of Debian, but not so much for desktop uses. If you're entirely new to Linux, I suggest looking at Mint. It's based off of Ubuntu which is based off of Debian. It's clean, easy to use and has a lot of documentation. Either the new version just came out, or it's going to very soon.

For a new comer the "install everything from scratch" approach isn't the best. Yes, you learn a lot, but you get a lot of frustration on the way. I think it's better to start with an user oriented Distro like Mint and then move towards to something a little more advanced.

I would suggest you install it on virtualbox first. I agree with draalin, it's actually how I started with linux. Arch is really great and you can make it look exactly how you want. Build it from scratch, install only what you want. Here is a video tutorial on how to install it on virtualbox.

I would suggest you install it on virtualbox first. I agree with draalin, it's actually how I started with linux. Arch is really great and you can make it look exactly how you want. Build it from scratch, install only what you want. Here is a video tutorial on how to install it on virtualbox.

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VirtualBox is great, especially for learning environments. I have one that I use as a test VPS - always try out new software and configurations before actually using them on my VPS. For learning Linux, there's no better way!